Soliloquies 17.1

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17.1

Table of Contents Editor’s Note // 3

by Lizy Mostowski Editorial Board // 4 Contributors // 5 Fiction H.A. Carnegie // 9

by Rowan Cornell-Brown Creative Non-Fiction Not From Here // 17

by Emily Choo Little Did He Know, There Would Be No Great Triumph

by Justin Darroch

//

23

Poetry Conservative Majority // 33 Avril Lavigne Variations // 35 The Slime of Life // 37

by Spencer Gordon QUESTIONS TO ASK A ROMANTIC INTEREST WHILE ON A LONG AND BORING BUT NEVERTHELESS BEAUTIFUL HIKE THROUGH THE WORLD’S LARGEST WALNUT GROVE IN THE MIDDLE OF JULY IN ARSLANBOB, KYRGYZSTAN // 37

by Emily Choo the first day of kindergarten, for mother //

by Jacqueline Hannah EMILY AS THE DOOR // 39

by Darren Demaree Pandora // 40

by Matthew Walsh Baggage Tax // 41

by Robyn Smith Two Complaints // 42

by Nick Bitzas

38

This past summer I was in Lithuania with Summer Literary Seminars. There I realized many things, but, amongst them, I realized, again, the importance of literary community, whether local, national, or international. I realized that place has a deep influence on a writer’s voice, tone, interests. I realized how writers from different backgrounds compliment one another. I realized that I was Polish. I realized that I was Canadian. I realized that I was a Montrealer.

Soliloquies 17.1

Editor’s Note Lizy Mostowski

The writers we have featured in Soliloquies 17.1 come into dialogue with themes concerned with identity, loneliness, uniqueness and loss. These writers are a part of our community, whether they are Montrealers, whether they are not Montrealers. They are all a part of the same community. Their works have originated from all over Canada, even dipping into the States, yet their pieces all speak to one another and approach similar themes from different perspectives. We are also excited to finally present you with some creative non-fiction from our fellow Concordians, Justin Darroch and Emily Choo.

A special thanks to Spencer Gordon, our friend from Toronto, for contributing poems to this issue. Spencer is a friend that I met two summers ago through SLS in Montreal. He has just published his first collection of short fiction, Cosmo (Coach House Books) this Fall season.

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Editorial Board Lizy Mostowski Editor-in-Chief Candice Maddy Creative Director Robin Graham Managing Editor Steph Colbourn Online Editor Dave Crosbie Senior Fiction Editor Ali Pinkney Senior Poetry Editor Karl Fenske Associate Fiction Editor Hailey Wendling Associate Fiction Editor Domenica Martinello Associate Poetry Editor Colleen Romaniuk Associate Poetry Editor Matthew Dunleavy Graphic Designer

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Nick Bitzas is a writer, actor and filmmaker from Montreal. He is currently studying English Literature with a minor in History at Concordia University.

Soliloquies 17.1

Contributors

Emily Choo is a Creative Writing student at Concordia University in Montreal, where she was born and raised. If she had to describe her poetry, she would probably say, “things that I saw in my brain”. She enjoys traveling, Netflix, and eating.

Rowan Cornell-Brown is from Vermont but lives in Montreal. He writes stories, which have previously appeared in The Void and Ribbon Pig. He also works in an office and is in a band called How Sad and another band called Ruff Talons.

One of his original songs, ‘Make this Alright’ appears in the independent film “Here Build Your Homes”.

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Justin Darroch lives and writes in Montreal. He was born in Windsor, Ontario, but grew up in the Niagara Region before moving to Montreal in 2008. He studied at Concordia University, and is by no means a vegetarian.

Darren C. Demaree is living in Columbus, Ohio with his wife and children. He is the recipient of two Pushcart Prize nominations, and his first full collection, “As We Refer To Our Bodies” is due this winter from 8th House Publishing House.

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Spencer Gordon is the author of the short story collection Cosmo (Coach House Books, 2012). You’re gonna love it! He is also co-editor of the online literary magazine The Puritan and of the Toronto-based micro-press Ferno House. His 2011 chapbook Feel Good!

Look Great! Have a Blast! was nominated for the bpNichol Chapbook Award. He teaches at Humber College and OCAD University. Find out more scintillating details at www.spencer-gordon.com.

Soliloquies 17.1

Jacqueline Hanna is a native of Montreal currently attending Concordia University. Her interests sometimes include ornithology, occasional minor substance abuse, and defiantly not losing things. Her favorite kind of sandwich includes tomato.

Robyn Smith is from Newmarket, Ontario but has lived in almost every province across Canada before feeling at home in Montreal.

She grew up writing and drawing and now studies Creative Writing and English Literature at Concordia University. She’s inspired

by Bukowski, Plath, and the conversations between drunken strangers late at night on the metro.

Matthew Walsh is a poet from the East Coast of Nova Scotia attending the English and Creative Writing program at York University. He writes in all kinds of styles but is more focused on taking language and making it as weird as possible to test its limits. His writing is mostly noted for its unique voice and comedic tones. That being said, he takes poetry very seriously. He has works published in Zaum, Kazoo Kazine, and now in Soliloquies.

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Fiction

Rowan Cornell-Brown

To Jamie: Think of this book as a small piece in one of life’s greatest puzzles: What is love, and where does it get us?

Yours, H.A. Carnegie

Soliloquies 17.1

H.A. Carnegie Rowan Cornell-Brown

The reading had gone better than expected. He hadn’t had a drink in an hour now, but this was not a problem yet. He had a glass and a pitcher of water. If the pitcher ran out he had a very nice girl at the bookstore who would fill the pitcher with more water.

“But why does it have to be water?” he had asked.

“It’s not that we mind if you’re drunk—,” they said, “god knows it wouldn’t make a difference—but you can’t be reeking up there.”

To Claire: Within books there are many buried things. Dig out what you can from them, and find what you’ve dug out of yourself in the process.

Yours, H.A. Carnegie The line was long, so long he could not see the end of it; they had to ask people to curl around the edge of the bookshelf and start spilling into non-fiction.

“Thirty seconds per person,” the nice—and nice-looking—girl at the bookstore reminded him. Her name was on a lanyard: Brooke.

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Rowan Cornell-Brown He said, “You don’t have to remind me, Brooke.”

To Alison: Funny that yours is just the look I had in mind when writing our heroine. I hope you have her good heart (and lack her unfortunate taste in men!).

Yours, H.A. Carnegie To Sarah: Funny that yours is just the look I had in mind when writing our heroine. I hope you have her good heart (and lack her unfortunate taste in men!).

Yours, H.A. Carnegie He had not selected any passages to read ahead of time, only inserting sticky notes randomly into the book during the cab ride over.

He opened to them and read, but had to edit aloud as he went. Towards the end he wasn’t even reading, just making things up.

He posed for a photo. The young woman took a phone from her friend and showed him the picture that had just been taken. He looked downright lecherous. And old. His arm was wrapped too tightly around her and his head was bent too far towards her and he was actually leering and his left eye was half open. And his skin was yellow. She went off giggling with her friend. He drank a whole glass of water and filled another, almost shake free. He thought the light was too harsh for a bookstore. This was a big corporate one, the type he thought did studies on things 10 like what the lighting should be like and what

Rowan Cornell-Brown

To Winnie: Funny that yours is just the look. Thanks very much for coming. You seem like a perfectly lovely person, and I really hope you like my book.

Yours, H.A. Carnegie

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kind of music should be played. Everything looked yellow like a bad tooth.

The book was Maladies of an Elephant Keeper’s Daughter. On the back it read, “Praise for H.A. Carnegie’s National Book Award-nominated The Passion Principle,” and quoted a lot of nice things: the phrases tour de force, no holds barred, take no prisoners, and both Nabokovian and Kafkaesque. One critic even named it “the best book of 1998 so far.”

He could remember 1998 better than all subsequent and almost all preceding years. The line still wrapped itself around the corner, and his pitcher of water was almost empty; he looked for the girl but she was off somewhere. He vaguely needed to piss.

To Franklin: I hope you enjoy this book. I myself have decent feelings about it. If you do enjoy it, maybe you’ll like some of my earlier stuff too.

You look like a writer, so I imagine you’re not one, or not one yet—you aren’t mean or ugly.

Yours, H.A. Carnegie I like it, she had said. I heard you, he said, but 11 why do you say it like that? I said I like it,

Rowan Cornell-Brown and I mean it, she said. You just don’t like it as much, he said. That’s true, she said. Well of course you don’t like it as much, he said. It’s shit. That’s not true, she said. It is true, he said. It’s shit. I’m the author and I say it’s shit. If you would just say it’s shit too I’d feel much better, because I’d know I can still trust you. It’s shit, she said. It’s horrible. And they both laughed. But seriously, she said.

To Omar: Thanks for coming. I’ve enclosed $60. Go across the street, buy a bottle of something good and clear and bring it back to me. You can keep the change. Be subtle about it.

Yours, H.A. Carnegie “I’m already halfway through,” this man was saying. “I can’t put it down.” He was short and had lots of curly hair, which seemed inappropriate for someone over forty. He was wearing a straight-cut black leather jacket, and something in his look said he had masturbated to the sex scenes.

12

She took issue with the sex scenes. The sheer number of them is staggering, she said. I can’t believe you said ‘sheer’ and ‘staggering’ in the same sentence like that, he said. Well I’m sorry, she said, but I’m disconcerted by how much of this book seems to have been written while you were horny. I wrote The Passion Principle when I was thirty-three and surrounded by graduate students, he said. You don’t think I was horny then? I think you showed more restraint, she said. I think I had ideas, he said.

Rowan Cornell-Brown The lovely young lady who has just handed me my own book made a point of ensuring I knew I was signing it for her mom. So I’m glad you like my books. She seemed mortified at the possibility that I might think she would like them. Maybe the smile I gave her was a little too something or other.

Anyway, I don’t think it’s ridiculous of me to think a twenty-something in a hip sweater would like my book. Maybe she reads David Foster Wallace. I bet that’s it. Shit.

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To Patricia:

Yours, H.A. Carnegie

To Antoinette: She dies at the end. She gets cancer.

Yours, H.A. Carnegie

“If everyone could just sit tight,” Brooke said, “or I guess I should say ‘stand tight,’ Mr. Carnegie’s not leaving; he’s just running to the bathroom.”

Who were these people? Why were they still here? Why could he only pee in spurts, and why did he have to wipe at the end? Who wipes their dick? He wasn’t even fifty yet. Were they really going to just stand there waiting while he wiped his dick? They were.

To Sebastian: I want to apologize for the following sentences: “She slammed on the brakes.”

“Her heart pounded in her chest.”

13

Rowan Cornell-Brown “Her eyes met his.”

“His eyes met hers.”

“Something grabbed her attention.”

“She drifted off to sleep.”

“The hours crawled by.”

“This is good,” the fat agent had said. “This is real good. You know I went to the movies last night and every goddamn preview I saw was for a movie based on a book? I can see, uh, Kitty being played by that girl. Shit. What’s her name?”

“Kristen Stewart.”

“Yeah. Anyway,” the fat man continued, “every goddamn movie based on a book. It’s an amazing time for literature.”

To Rebecca: Thank you for waiting. This book is about love and death. Really. It is about love and death. I think about it every day and feel something important and fresh and mind-blowing, but it’s just so hard to put into words. So I tried to say it with Kitty and her boyfriend and her cancer, and it didn’t work. So I’m sorry, but I’ve got deadlines and bills and all that.

Yours, H.A. Carnegie To Abraham: I’ve replaced you with someone else already. When I think of your name I will imagine a different face that I’ve made up.

Yours, H.A.C. 14 To Dorie: Without even meaning to, you have pissed

Rowan Cornell-Brown To Sam: What do you think? Why do I have to think of things to say?

To Albert: This cannot be your real name.

How’s it coming? she said. Fine, he said. When do I get to read it? she said. When it’s done, he said, and sighed. What? she said. You know what, he said. I can guess, she said. I had one bullet in the chamber, he said. What? she said. I had one bullet—You know the saying, ‘lost his fastball?’ he said. Sure, she said. Well, that’s what they’ll say, he said. You think that? she said. There’s two ways to lose your fastball, he said. Way number one—you stop giving a shit; you made your mark and you made your money and now you’re just going to drink and enjoy it and churn out what churns out, he said. And way number two? she said.

Way number two is you never had a fastball, he said. You used all your bullshit at once, and you were lucky because they swung and missed, but now it’s o and one and you’re naked up there on the mound and where does that get you?

Soliloquies 17.1

me off incredibly.

He could see the end of the line, which seemed a small miracle. He imagined that the bookstore had closed long ago and that he and this line and Brooke were the only life forms left. He could not fathom that the people in line had anything to do with him. They happened to be in line and he happened to be at the table. They happened to have a book and he happened to have a pen. It was only natural that they would put the book on the table and he would put his pen to it.

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Creative Non-Fiction

Emily Choo Justin Darroch

SOME RECENT CONVERSATIONS I’VE HAD WITH STRANGERS ABOUT MY IDENTITY: “You are...from Italy?”

“No, I’m from Montreal.”

“Oh, I am from Chicoutimi!”

Soliloquies 17.1

Not From Here Emily Choo

“Are you from France?”

“No.” “Portugal?”

“No.” “Mexico!”

“No.” “You look strange.”

“Are you from France?”

“No.” “You are from Mexico!”

“No.” “Somewhere down south?”

“No.” “Africa?” “...”

“He wants to know where you’re from.”

“Tell him I’m Canadian.”

“He says you don’t look Canadian.”

“Ask him what a Canadian looks like.” ++ Recently, at work, I was asked by a customer something along the lines of “where are you from?” When I told him I was from here, Montreal, Canada, he then said, “Oh, but your parents...?” This enraged me for two reasons: one, 17 I’m at work. A more appropriate question would be,

Emily Choo “How much do these jeans cost?” Two, it’s nobody’s business where my parents are from.

Asking “where are you from?” implies that I’m not from here. Not only that, it asks for my history, my parents’ histories, my whole life, how I was raised and where, my cultural values and beliefs. These questions are personal and the right to ask them can only be earned with time, trust, and mutual respect. The answers are long and complex because this is my life and I am not an object to be fetishized. I know people mean well when they ask. I know they’re just curious.

But I’m not going to ask you about your underwear, even if I’m curious about it. My ethnicity is not a guessing game.

It’s weird to expose myself like this, on paper. It seems permanent somehow, though I feel like I’m constantly shifting in and out of these identities. I don’t feel entirely comfortable sharing these details about myself, but I feel that it’s necessary somehow. If I show you who I am, or at least part of who I am, then maybe I will be seen as a person, not an exotic face.

I was born and raised in Montreal. My mother was born in Israel and my father in Guyana. My mother’s mother in Iran and my father’s father in China. I know, it’s crazy. Both my parents’ families emigrated to Canada when my parents were very young. My dad grew up in Toronto, and my mother in Montreal. I was raised in the suburbs. I went to English language schools. Growing up, my friends and I liked to bike to the dépanneur and buy candy with the change we found lying around our homes. We ate it on the playground and talked about boys. My favourite brand of orange juice was, and still is, Tropicana because my dad used to work for the 18 company and that was the only brand we drank. I

Emily Choo Soliloquies 17.1

was raised kind of like a white person, if that’s a thing I can say. We had a house, a bit of money, and I went to school with other suburban kids. For a long time I thought I was white and I kept wondering why people were calling me Chinese. I wondered why Italians were cool and Asians were not, and why it started to feel personal when people pulled at the corners of their eyes to make them slanted. I looked in the mirror and made my eyes wide. I wondered why people kept assuming I was Chinese when my eyes were clearly not like Chinese people’s eyes. I couldn’t figure out why I was different.

I don’t know if I can talk about my own life like this because I’m still living it. I feel like I’ve straddled the line between being different and not being different for so long that I don’t know what I am. I want to say, look at me. I’m just like you. By the time I was 19, the amount of knowledge I had about China was the same as any other kid educated in Quebec (which is to say, very little). And yet, people kept asking me questions about China. Did I speak Chinese? Did I have statues of Buddha in my house? There came a point when I finally saw myself for what I am: a person of colour. I’ve realized that although I grew up in an environment similar to most Canadian-born and -raised kids, I am slightly different. I’ve struggled with the weight of my differences. People have always put more emphasis on my ethnicity, but I always felt that being attracted to women set me more apart. But this emphasis on my ethnicity, the amount of times I meet someone new and they ask me where I’m from, is what forces me to write about it. I have to get it out of the way. I have to clear it up.

I traveled to China for the first time in the summer of 2011. It was a 12-credit program, offered to students at Concordia University to go to 19

Emily Choo Beijing and learn to speak Mandarin. I had taken a Politics of China course in the fall (partially because it fit my schedule, and partially because I have an interest in international politics) and had “caught the bug” as my professor had said. I began to consider a career in Chinese studies.

I added Chinese Language and Culture as a minor to my degree. When I heard about the opportunity to go to China and learn Mandarin, I immediately signed up. But it had nothing to do with my ethnicity and everything to do with my interest in politics. I didn’t see myself as a Chinese person studying Chinese culture, I saw myself as a Western person studying Chinese. That’s the background I came from, after all.

It was strange to travel to China for the first time. In Canada, I had always been seen as Chinese. People would see my last name and assume “Asia”. It wasn’t really a question; they were telling me who I was from. In China, locals would cock their heads at me and say, “You look Chinese.” Traveling with other Canadians meant that I was included in Chinese people’s ideas of Canada. I was there as a white person. I would say, “Yes, I am Chinese. Half Chinese.” But then I would go back to my room and check my email on my Macbook. I am so different from someone born and raised in China. How could it be that just two generations ago my grandparents were living in the country I was now visiting as a complete foreigner? I felt privileged, rich, lucky compared to most of the people we saw. And the people we saw, saw me that way too: “American”, wealthy, free.

China didn’t feel like home, but I felt a strange sadness seeing Chinese babies with their parents.

The babies, they looked just how I looked as a baby, except they fit in. In North America, I don’t see myself in other Chinese people. That’s okay, but it was strange to look at someone and think, 20 that could be me. Before China I had never really

Emily Choo Soliloquies 17.1

felt that.

The truth is that I’m still trying to work out where I’m from. When I was 18 I got my first tattoo; a simple maple leaf on my arm. I thought, at the time, that wherever I go and whatever I do, I will always be Canadian. I wanted this permanently on my body. Now I know better: I got that tattoo because I wanted to be Not-Chinese. I wanted everyone to stop telling me who I am. I wanted to be in control of my identity; who I am and when I want to tell people. I’m Canadian, look, here’s proof...

The only person who believed this was me. My tattoo has never stopped people from assuming I’m an immigrant. Of course it hasn’t. And the more people come up to me and make this assumption, the more I doubt my own assertion that I am “Canadian”. I struggle with this. What does it mean to be born in a privileged society but to not have the privilege of passing as a member of that society? I’ve begun to doubt if I even want to be seen as Canadian anymore. I am not “white Canadian”. I am not Chinese. I am not Israeli. I am made up of many little pieces, many of them not related to ethnicity at all. Just like we all are.

People have said, “What do you expect?” as if I should somehow not only be prepared for this, but also be open and accepting to invasive questions. I am not here to educate strangers on my ethnicity, or give lessons in manners.

But somehow I have to, because otherwise it will never end. Racism is so engrained in our society that people don’t even realize when they’re being racist. People don’t see how “Where are you from?” is offensive because they think they’re just being curious. But why? If people are really curious about who I am, then a quicker way to find out would be to ask me about things I like or dislike.

21 The thing is, most people are probably not inter-

Emily Choo ested in who I am. They just want to reaffirm that I am one thing, and they are another.

I recently had an interview for a new job. It was a group interview, and among the different people there, there was me and one other Asian woman. The person conducting the interview got our names mixed up, and when I said “No, that’s me,” as she was saying my name and looking at the other woman, and she said, “Oh, sorry, it’s just, you know.” And she motioned to the fact that we were both Asian, as if we were indistinguishable from each other.

I got the job, which meant meeting a lot of new people. A manager saw my last name: “Oh, what are you?” She asked. Someone in the staff room: “Are you mixed?” Another time, while talking about my apartment: “Have you been here long?”

I was telling someone my family name so she could add me on Facebook, and she seemed surprised. She asked me about my background, and I told her I was half Chinese and half Israeli. “Oh,” she said, “I thought you were white.”

And I laughed because the world is strange sometimes. I guess I’ve come to realize that I’m not really “from here”, no matter how hard I try to assert that. I’ve also come to realize that sometimes people are not as hostile as they seem to be, and if no one can figure out where I’m from, then I can be from anywhere.

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Soliloquies 17.1

Little Did He Know, There Would Be No Great Triumph Justin Darroch

It was dark and my legs were covered in sweat. I was dreaming…again.

I lifted the blankets to let some cool air in, but then I was too cold. I shivered and pulled the blankets closer, and became too hot again. The blank white page of my little bedside notepad was glowing off the moonlight. I consulted it for a moment, but as usual, we had no business to discuss. For years now I’ve kept a bedside notepad with me, but almost never used it. Why? Why don’t I write things down? Isn’t that what writers do? Why have I come this far with nothing to show for it. Was it too late? It couldn’t be, I’m only twenty-four. Or am I already twenty-four?

I’m tempted to record this dream. I remember there was a conversation: “So I’m thinking about writing about real stuff, you know, sort of like…non-fiction.”

“Hmmm. Sounds boring.”

“What, why?”

“Well what are you going to write about, the war?

History?”

“No.” “Of course not, it’s not like you’ve actually witnessed a war or any hard times.”

“What about September 11th?”

“Oh yeah, how was that?” …

“Either way, that’s not what I mean by nonfiction. It doesn’t have to be about history and war and hard times. Why can’t I just write about myself, you know, like a memoir?”

“A memoir?”

“Sure, why not?”

23 “Well for starters you’re twenty-four years old.”

Justin Darroch “I know, it’s a bit young, but—” “A bit young? How about a bit old.”

“How is that too old?”

“Let me put it this way. You’ve spent your whole life dilly-dallying about, racing through life like a child, playing with your toys. You invented all your fun, all your games, all your historical events. And now, now you think you’re just going to go back in time and record what was actually going on.”

“Yes. I think so, yes.”

“How?” “I just have to remember it all.” …

And that’s all I can remember. But I have this fleeting sense that there was someone else in my dream, someone other than myself. Either way, it’s over now—stupid dream.

Over the past year death has been haunting me. It certainly didn’t help that I lost several friends over the course of that year: a favourite teacher, a young friend from work, and the one that had the biggest impact on me, my uncle. The reason why I believe his death made the biggest splash was because it occurred the night my daughter was born. In fact, my uncle was celebrating her birth with my grandparents; champagne and cigars were involved. He passed in the night.

Her birth seemed to usher in an entirely new sense of life. When childhood ends, the fringes of life are revealed. I wish I never had to know, I wish that I could live an entire life without knowing about death until it took me one night in my sleep. Seeing life clearly has a way of making things appear darker. My uncle once told me it was like a conveyor belt. We are all on it and we are all moving forward at the same speed. We try our best not to look down, and we often forget 24 entirely that we are on it. But every now and then

Justin Darroch Soliloquies 17.1

something comes along, like perhaps the birth of a baby, that reminds us where we are. And in that joy of watching her climb up onto the conveyor belt, I noticed that far down along the line an old family member had just fallen off. It was at that moment that I looked down and saw where I was standing. I have never been the same since.

Right now I’m standing at a fork in the road.

I might be a chef or I might be a writer—these are the two things that I love to do. But I’ve always been a dreamer. Practicality is shouldering its way in and I must respect it. This is troubling because I’ve always felt comfortable passively imagining the way life would play out for me, reassuring myself that, for now, it’s just the first draft—the appetizer course. If life is around the corner, then I need to wake-up soon. I should stop drinking and smoking, I should stop writing fiction and try to write about real life, and hell, maybe I should stop writing altogether and get a job as a chef—that’s something real, something tangible. I can cut my finger off if I screw up; I’ve never been able to hurt myself by writing.

But it hurts me to write this. I have always resisted documenting my daily impressions because I thought it was too late to start a journal or diary. If I had no record of the past twenty-four years of my life, what was the point in starting now? But equally so, I cannot start to write my memoirs because I’m only twenty-four, so what sort of conclusion am I to arrive at by the time the memoir is complete?

It is for these reasons that I am committing editorial adultery right now, and it is for these reasons, in the past, that I have safely chosen to write fiction. I have to invent and dream up all my stories because I have little to say about myself.

Perhaps, should I get old like all the others that 25 have come before me, I will have something to

Justin Darroch write about. But for now I have to rely on twists and turns, murders, setups, and tragic deaths—this is what people like—this is what sells.

A strange by-product of my frail efforts at trying to ground myself in reality has been a week-long string of frighteningly vivid dreams. I think this may, in part, be due to my recent attempts at subduing my fictional imagination. Or maybe it has to do with drinking less…either way, something has changed. And I cannot help but notice the irony here: I lay down some new goals for myself (less fiction and less drinking), but then, not only does my creative tap run dry, but my dreams explode into color. I wish the same could have been said about my writing. ++

The dreams continue.

I was trapped, that’s all I knew. I had been compromised by some unnamed force within the government—their representative was a hard-faced woman. The government was to have me host and cater a party for all my friends. The hard-faced woman was there and would see to it that I followed through with the “arrangements”: a select few of my friends were considered dangerous and needed to “go”—if you know what I mean—and it was my job to see to this. I was to serve food at the party, and for that select few of friends I would use a special butter containing a poison that caused the body to melt. I was hesitant and somewhat heartbroken about it, but it needed to be done. In return the government would grant me access to grad school. (This was supposed to be the bright side.)

After the torturous and quite vivid melting of my friends, I tried to disconnect myself from the party, but soon found myself pursued by the hard 26 faced woman and an entourage of government

Justin Darroch Soliloquies 17.1

officials. I should have easily been able to outrun them, but in dreams we all seem to carry sandbags around our ankles. I was trapped, and like a gullible fool, I took the easy way out.

Handcuffed and carried back to the party, I was being accused of murder—it was a setup! I was brought back to stand before the bountiful buffet of my food, with the puddles of my former friends scattered around it. Then I was read my sentence, which was perhaps the most vivid part of my dream: Upon graduation I would be sentenced to two years of prison. Two years; a duration of time that, even from within the dream, I could not help but realize was the same amount of time necessary for the completion of grad school; an option that I have been struggling to commit to for fear of never seeing the light at the end of the academic tunnel.

Yes, I was trapped; helplessly pinned down by that fork in the road of my life.

It was beginning to get light outside my window. I lifted the blankets again to cool off my sweat. I’m wide awake now. And with the dream so clear in my head, and knowing that it would soon evaporate like gasoline on hot pavement, I scribbled it down into my empty notepad. There!

I’ve started, I thought to myself. But it still did not present me with any sense of accomplishment. It was just a dream, we all have them, and what did this have to do with writing non-fiction or attempting a memoir? Nothing! It was just a poor excuse for writing. Dreams are the most boring, useless, talentless, form of writing that there is, and like a fool I was taking the easy way out again. Why have I not written about the birth of my daughter? What about my future wife? These are people in my life that I love—people who have changed my life—where are 27 they? Why do I just write about myself? Because

Justin Darroch that’s what a memoir is, isn’t it? But shouldn’t I talk about them? Why can I only write dialog between me and myself? That’s narcissistic.

Maybe you suffer from a disorder? Lots of writers do. But I’m not narcissistic, it’s just a memoir! Isn’t it supposed to be about yourself?

I hung my head and placed the chicken-scratched notepad back where it was. I rolled over into the foetal position and waited until I got tired again. I don’t think it happened for at least another hour. ++

I was in the bustle of a shopping mall, and entering a video-game store I saw Professor Anthony Sisti working behind the counter. My heart leapt and I immediately went to approach him, but someone cut in front of me to buy something. I was content to wait.

He taught at Concordia University and was the only teacher that I felt comfortable brown-nosing to. I genuinely found him very interesting and I loved his methodical style of teaching. He was also, at the time, the only teacher I went to see during office hours. The last time I saw him was about a week after my daughter’s birth. I visited him during his office hours and I told him her name was Anya; he said it was a beautiful name, and we discussed The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch. I asked him about UBIK; a loopy novel about death from a sci-fi perspective. He gave me a face that said Whoa, that’s another can of worms. But he said to come by his office hours next week (the last week of school) so we could discuss it. I was already in the habit of waiting in line for all the other students to talk with him first so I wouldn’t feel rushed, so it was fine. Sure enough my life became 28 very busy with the new baby, so I never went. I

Justin Darroch Soliloquies 17.1

found out a few months later that he had died that summer.

The most memorable part about the dream was why I wanted to talk to him. I wanted to tell him how crazy it is that people are going around saying you’re dead. As if we would have another sci-fi discussion about how K. Dick it is that you’re here, now, fittingly working in a video-game store with comics and space invaders.

All I wanted was to hear his take on the conspiracy circling around, because I was convinced it was not true. I was still waiting for the person in front of me, and when he was done, another person cut in line just before me. I could still see his face, but he was busy, then another person cut in, and another, until I found myself at the back of a long line of people. I just wanted to talk to him in private, but I could no longer even see his face though it was once so clear to me.

I woke up to a bright and angry consciousness, as if I was never sleeping at all. How could it end there? I lay furiously in bed for a minute, trying to hold on to the image of his face. When my anger settled, I allowed myself a brief tear, refusing to go back to sleep. This is torture, I thought, rising and smearing the sleep from my eyes.

I was too emotionally charged to write, so I decided to read some of my older writing, most of which I have carelessly lost over the years. It cheered me up, mostly because the content was fun and positive—it was fiction. Writing, it seemed, was so much simpler then.

I remembered something that Anthony Sisti told me and a friend way back in my first year at Concordia. It was after a Short-Fiction class and I can’t exactly remember what it was we were 29 discussing, but I clearly remember Sisti rolling

Justin Darroch his head and saying with a melancholy smile that he was a failed writer. It stuck out in my mind forever, truthfully, but never had any impact on how I perceived him. For all I know he was joking, I’ll never know because we only ever spoke about other writing…and he was damn good at doing that. But I secretly always wanted to ask him if he used to be a writer, or if he would read some of my writing, though I feared it would be ruthlessly (and quite methodically) torn apart.

God bless him.

Today, I approach the term “failed writer” from a different angle (not that I was ever sure what my angle was before). I could not justify it as a place where one arrives. It’s true that one may quit writing, or even perhaps be fired from writing; but there are no failed writers, because there are no finished writers. Or, in another way of speaking, every writer is a failing writer until their life is complete; there would be no great triumph, at least not as far as I could see.

There was money out there, somewhere, and perhaps one day even peace of mind, but how could one claim to have succeeded at writing, to happily be able put down the pen for good.

Perhaps I am wrong, and perhaps this wrong can only be made right with time and a little patience. But as for now, I am just as much a failed writer as I am a wise old man. The only thing that I’m failing at is continuing the story of my life; one must at least try to finish, even if he is to label himself a failed writer for the rest of time…

That’s it, isn’t it? That’s what I need to do. Just continue writing.

I’m not struggling; I’m just stalling. It’s not my memory that’s getting in the way, it’s my pride. My excuses are weak because they’re rooted 30 in a fear of starting over. But that’s where I’m

Justin Darroch Soliloquies 17.1

wrong, because it’s not starting over, I’m just continuing from a new place. And all of that can change at any moment, because it doesn’t matter your age. All that matters is that you choose a place to start. And if the writing of my earlier days has taught me anything, it’s never a bad idea to start with your dreams.

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Poetry 32

Spencer Gordon Emily Choo Jacqueline Hannah Darren Demaree Matthew Walsh Robyn Smith Nick Bitzas

Life, friends, is Boring-go.

And only boring people think so.

And only boring people think of your art.

And only boring people think art is unnecessary.

But only extraordinary Canadians think your art is unnecessary.

But only extraordinary Canadians think art is boring.

Soliloquies 17.1

Conservative Majority Spencer Gordon

Only ordinary Canadians meditate on the hypnotic energy of rivers.

Only ordinary Canadians work through colonialism, wilderness, loss.

Only boring Canadians write novels.

Only non-boring Canadians write novels called The Canadian Shield.

Only boredom is Canadian.

Only Canadians go boo boo boo boo boo bum.

Only the blood made the deer taste sweeter.

Only the dogs tore the deer’s skin.

Only in Alberta does art rise higher than an eagle.

Only in the eagle’s nest of art do I write my grant app, son.

Only in Banff can you see the hounds circle the kill.

Only at the Pierre Berton house does the internet lag.

Only in Canada is poetry alive and well and mattering more and more!

Because poetry never dies, and never died, in Canada.

Because poetry is like a suit of plate mail in Canada.

Because poetry was never written in Middle English in Canada.

Because poetry’s fashion is urban upscale.

Because poetry is a beautiful dress in Canada.

Poetry is healthy in a conservative majority.

Poetry won the biggest contest for the conservative majority.

I liked poetry on facebook in Canada.

I tagged poetry on facebook in Canada then deleted my post.

I had brunch with forty-six poets on facebook in Canada.

I had brunch with forty-six poets on facebook in Banff.

What if books are in fashion in Canada.

What if books are where the walls go in Canada.

What if books highlight what you’re wearing against them in Canada.

What if books are read by graduate students in Canada.

33

Spencer Gordon Then there’s a purse designed to hold your poems in Canada.

Then only in gucci gucci louis louis fendi fendi prada.

Then only here could I be happy.

Then only in poetry could I be in Canada.

34

I once thought virginity was a gift you gave freely; it couldn’t be stolen or influenced. It was autonomous.

Didja think that I was gonna give it up to you? I knew people were better off alone, anyways. Alone every day!

Most of the time, loneliness was purifying, a perfumed sweetness; in memory, a green day of mall-crashes,

Soliloquies 17.1

Avril Lavigne Variations Spencer Gordon

possibility, and Black Star fragrance. Meanwhile, proximity to lovers was no indication of affection; I learned that moods flutter like early March weather, that a girl’s heart is embittered, guarded, wet. A sk8ter’s heart is the spontaneous overflow of powerful emotions, enacted in the endless summer, tense present: two zeroes lined up on my English placement. So I kissed the void, spun hookups into needless complexity, wracked by inauthenticity.

Why’d ya have to go and make things so complicated? asked my genuine heart. To thine own heart, be true, I cried, but realized after twenty-four years in the pursuit of virtue, I’d get my period of transgression (or else, I’d be doomed to myself, fudging the good). Madness, seeing Hell-light flicker over Heaven’s pure mud, mere anarchy loosed upon the strip-mall pavement where my name was writ with skateboards, pizza crusts, jet-black rosebuds. Black circles ’round the capital A. Black eye-liner slathered on a power-chord progression, the boring story (yawn) reverted to the chorus, verse, chorus (the howling curses).

Then I put on reigns, emerged from a dream, the damn, cold, night of the soul, and thought back to something older: feelings like oh sweet country, being Shania and Chantal’s maiden. It was gettin’ dark, too dark to see, but I gave myself up to freedom, that girlish tide of synth, backing vocals, harmony. There was nothing more obvious; there has been no artifice. And weird—nothing since.

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The Slime of Life Spencer Gordon i.

There’s a big stash of javex on the washing machine Just, like, if u wanted to drink it to commit suicide.

If u had two twins & were iced up like a winner.

If u were Jackfrost with so much jewelry. i.e., so cold Like u had brain freeze? Or gave lessons on sipping Syrups? i think u ball slightly harder than most & that’s just this uh, um, hunch. Cause? Balling on a level that’s Even Mysterious to Me. To Marc Jacobs, too.

To Triple H. To Gucci Mane. To James Franco. To a Penguin’s Knee.

Bitch I’m broke. Rockin this ice got me frozen to the floor. ii. so alls i gotta do is chew gum and this thing is over? can’t tab to escape teh scene and we stare up like Christ came back! i mean there are girls out there who still don’t know how to do their makeup.

I’ve bought everything from a store to look like i belong on an LA big buidlings, and everybody’s apple. There was conversation until it stopped. I am so literally angry at art for not saving me, for leaving me in literallylikehell. baby’s mole got bigger since last time, but now you know you’ve done everything and conquered all image. Life is extremely long, but we’re kinda glad, right? Kinda just got promoted to a word, according to gongle and light.

36

Cashews or walnuts?

Peaches or nectarines?

Mozarella or parmesan?

Soliloquies 17.1

QUESTIONS TO ASK A ROMANTIC INTEREST WHILE ON A LONG AND BORING BUT NEVERTHELESS BEAUTIFUL HIKE THROUGH THE WORLD’S LARGEST WALNUT GROVE IN THE MIDDLE OF JULY IN ARSLANBOB, KYRGYZSTAN Emily Choo

I said, The first thing I’ll do when I get to Italy is eat a large slice of pizza with mozzarella, black olives, olive oil, carmelized onions, and fresh cilantro.

You said the best olives you’ve ever had were in Morocco.

Green or black olives?

37

the first day of kindergarten, for mother Jacqueline Hannah Slip the knife into the slight hollow between the breast and the bone.

Remove the skin. Excise any red slivers of bone.

The pink flesh quivers slightly.

Cut the breast into bits.

Set it aside. Heat the pan. Sear the flesh.

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Nervous moment, alone & outside of Emily? How often my patience for a proper knock wanes & I become simple fact, slumped against the wood.

Soliloquies 17.1

EMILY AS THE DOOR Darren Demaree

39

Pandora Matthew Walsh Words and letters arranged from Lorna Crozier’s The Magician. i.

So then I`ll join the sawed woman asleep in her box. It’s too late now--she woke but did not see you go and now I am her eyes.

The cape we’ve torn to bits. We buried the rabbits (covered their grave with stones).

It’s as if your house disappeared, the woman pulled from the laundry basket.

The wind learned to sing songs out in the yard. He remembered back when the woman had eyes in her head.

I ate her love bone (it was most delicate).

My most magic moment came when her legs kicked. Even stones couldn’t hold her down. Half of her screamed that she had taken a rat for a lover. I swallowed her tongue too, til the head was empty as a magic box. ii.

The magician traveled on smoke to the home that had been his. He left his hat on the daybed and opened the box to the rats eyes hiding 40 in his wife’s head.

He carries a cancelled wedding under his eyes.

His Saturday mornings alone, with Bailey’s Irish Cream coffees.

On top of the kitchen counter sit 164 stamped, unsent invitations.

He rips them apart with his bare hands into confetti-sized pieces.

His knuckles are still blue, purple, and white from the weight of the three women he fucked behind her back, the stink of pussy and cheap perfume.

He uses the same fingers to stir his Irish coffees.

Soliloquies 17.1

Baggage Tax Robyn Smith

41

Two Complaints Nick Bitzas First Complaint: Charlie has been skinny all his life he’s a guy so this matters a great deal being skinny makes Charlie feel like the biggest guy in a crowd he’s the object of biological inspection a genetic anomaly a fornicator’s science experiment that went terribly wrong Two women once told Charlie: women don’t like dating bony men because it makes them feel big women like guys that are tall and stocky it makes them feel small Charlie knows them without knowing them.

Second Complaint: it’s politically incorrect to call someone fat but Charlie has been called skinny, scrawny, skin-and-bones, and skeletal countless times i guess these people with their perfect bodies that call Charlie skinny, scrawny, skin-and-bones, and skeletal don’t understand the pain of being scraggy, gaunt, and sticklike but they do understand the pain of being fat because Oprah and all her fat guests told them so.

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